British colonial expansion-8 times more than mainland China

From16th century to the beginning of 20th century, Britain has been carrying out colonial aggression and expansion, with colonies all over the world, so-called "the sun never sets". British colonial expansion is closely related to the development stages of primitive accumulation of capital, industrial capital and financial capital.

The period of primitive accumulation of capital in England is roughly from16th century to the rise of the industrial revolution in the late18th century. The characteristic of this period is that commercial capital plays a major role, and commercial capitalists become the main promoters of colonial expansion, and their colonial plunder is mainly carried out through trading companies specially authorized by the government. From the 1980s of 16 to the beginning of 17, Britain first colonized the east coast of North America, and by the 1930s of 18, more than 10 colonies had been established there. 16 12, British Virginia Company began to colonize Bermuda. In the 1920s and 1930s, Britain occupied some islands in the West Indies and turned them into plantations, slave trading places and pirate bases. By destroying Spain's "Armada" and then defeating the Netherlands in three Anglo-Dutch wars, Britain finally established its maritime hegemony.

/kloc-in the 0 th and 8 th centuries, Britain began to compete with France for colonial hegemony. In 1689 1763, Britain won the four major wars, thus expanding the scope of colonization. Especially after the "Seven Years' War" of 1756 1763, Britain not only won all the land in North America, Canada and east of the Mississippi River, but also seized Grenada and other places, and Florida, which was originally occupied by Spain, also belonged to Britain.

1783, North America 13 colony became independent, and British colonial activities in North America suffered a heavy blow. As a result, it shifted the focus of colonial expansion to the East, especially India. 1600, Britain established the East India Company. 65438+ On February 3rd, the same year, the company was granted a charter by Queen Elizabeth and became a British colonial institution in the East. 16 12, defeated the Portuguese in India, obtained the trade privilege from the Mughal dynasty in India, set up trading posts and warehouses in surat, and set up trading posts in Madras and Hugli in 1620 and 1633 respectively. 1858, the British Parliament passed the Indian Management Improvement Act, announcing the dissolution of the East India Company and the direct rule of India by the Queen of England.

/kloc-From the early to the middle of the 8th century, the British expeditionary fleet "inspected" the east coasts of Australia and New Zealand and began to emigrate to this area. In the war against Napoleon, Britain also captured many overseas colonies of France, the Netherlands and Spain, such as Seychelles, Mauritius, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), the Cape of Good Hope, Guyana, Trinidad and Malta.

With the rise and development of the industrial revolution, the power of British industrial capital reached its peak. The British government, representing the interests of the industrial bourgeoisie, made every effort to promote exports, turned from mercantilism to free trade policy, and began the colonial plunder period with industrial capital as the main driving force. With its strong economic strength and maritime hegemony, Britain expanded to a large number of "ownerless lands" in Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Pacific under the banner of "free trade" and established a huge colonial empire. The so-called "free trade" advertised by the British government is actually "if possible, trade plus intangible rules; Once necessary, trade plus rules will be implemented. " While establishing hegemony and control over a series of "ownerless land", Britain carried out military conquest and occupation of those "ownerless land" and countries unwilling to accept its "free trade" policy.

18141815, Britain forced Nepal to cede southern land. 1824 and 1852, Britain invaded Myanmar twice and part of it was incorporated into British India. 1824, the Netherlands was forced to cede Singapore to Britain, and Malaya was also included in the British sphere of influence. 184 1 and 1842, Brunei ceded Sarawak and North Borneo to Britain. 1843 1849, Britain successively annexed Sindh, Kashmir, Punjab and other regions, and completed the conquest of India; It also extended to the surrounding areas of India. Through two Opium Wars that invaded China, Britain received huge reparations, forcing China to open trading ports and cede Hong Kong Island (1842) and the land south of Boundary Street in Kowloon Peninsula (1860) to Britain. 1833, Britain occupied the Malvinas Islands near the east coast of South America. 1839, Britain occupied the port of Aden under the jurisdiction of Turkey. 1808, 186 1, 1874, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Gold Coast in Africa successively became British colonies. 1843, Britain annexed Natal.

After 1970s, capitalism began to transition from free competition to monopoly. Britain's status as a "world factory" has gradually lost, and the worldwide competition for sales markets and raw material production places has seriously endangered Britain's sphere of influence in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Many people in the British ruling group advocate adopting a colonial policy of active expansion and annexation. Since then, British imperial policy has changed from paying more attention to "informal influence" during the period of free capitalism to frantically chasing and annexing colonies.

In Asia, Britain launched two wars to invade Afghanistan in 1839 and 1878, forcing the latter to become a vassal state of Britain. 1886, Britain occupied Mandalay and completed the plan to merge Myanmar into India. 1887 declared that Zhemengxiong (Sikkim) was protected by it. In the same year, the Netherlands Maldives was changed to British protection. 1876 China Yunnan was forced to open to Britain. 1888 and 1904, Britain invaded China and Tibet twice. 1898, Britain took advantage of China's defeat in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1898 to lease Ahava and the North Kowloon Peninsula and its adjacent islands. In the Pacific Ocean, Britain occupied Fiji in 1874 and declared Papua as its protectorate in 1884.

1893 1904, Britain occupied Solomon Islands, Tonga, gilbert islands and Cook Islands successively. 1878, Britain seized the island of Cyprus from Turkey. However, Africa was the focus of British colonial struggle during this period. With the opening of 1869 Suez Canal, Egypt has become the focus of the struggle between Britain and France for the African continent. By 1882, Egypt had actually become a British colony. 1868 and 1885, Britain turned Basutoland and Betuna into its protected areas, and occupied Zululan in 1887. /kloc-At the end of 0/9, after fierce competition with German, French, Italian and other countries, Cautrat, Somali, Ugandan, Kenyan and Zanzibar islands in East Africa successively became British protectorates. 1899 Britain and France reached an agreement to carve up Africa and Sudan became a British colony. 1899 1902 After Ying Bu War, Britain occupied Transvaal and Orange, and South Africa became its colony.

By the beginning of the 20th century, the colonies in the world had been basically divided up, with Britain accounting for the largest share. 1876, with a colony of 22.5 million square kilometers and a population of 25190,000; By 19 14, it has increased to 33.5 million square kilometers of colonies with a population of 393.5 million, which is equivalent to 137 times the size of the British mainland and more than 8 times the population.